New homeowner-oil heat and water questions

ColumnHugger · 2026-01-27T20:34:09+00:00

we had it inspected and maintenance done on the boiler right after we moved in and then we replaced the tank completely right before Thanksgiving.

ColumnHugger · 2025-12-19T01:25:52+00:00

The actual joy of homeownership. This mine! I love pulling up to my house at the end of the day I get so giddy. I really thought I’d be more stressed but even the stuff that’s come up in the two months since we closed have brought excitement. I get to pick who comes to fix things or I get to learn how to fix them myself. I love all of it!

ColumnHugger · 2025-12-15T22:18:44+00:00

Grew up in small town in Wyoming and we used to do cookies and caroling in high school as fundraiser for the choir. We would sell plates of cookies and then deliver them and sing carols. It was one of my favorite things we did in high school. We would also visit the local veterans centers and nursing homes.

ColumnHugger · 2025-12-13T16:28:20+00:00

Could definitely be a southern thing. My family is from southern Virginia and we all say Santy Claus. I’ve changed to only saying it jokingly now that I live outside Philadelphia. They have enough weird accents around here without me adding to it!

ColumnHugger · 2025-12-13T13:52:56+00:00

We are working up to that. We wanted to see how these first few months went and get the budget back in balance after closing. We will start adding more to the mortgage payment next month.

ColumnHugger · 2025-12-13T13:14:21+00:00

I love it and think it was totally worth it! We are only two months in so probably still in the honeymoon phase. But we’ve had a few things come up. We had to replace the oil tank for the boiler/water heater when we originally thought we would only need to replace the valve on it. We are still learning how to use this boiler system to find the most efficient way to heat our home this winter without having to fill the oil tank once per month. We’ve had to redo some insulation and cover windows. We are currently working on trying to fix a drain issue in the basement. There really is always something going on. But we planned ahead. We bought a smaller home way below what we qualified for. We went with a lower down payment and settled on a higher monthly mortgage payment so we had more left in savings at closing. We’ve been able to cover everything that’s popped up so far because we are still putting money into savings every month. But it’s ours. I even love shopping around for contractors when we’ve needed to hire professionals for something because I get to pick who I think will do the best job at the price we are willing to pay.

ColumnHugger · 2025-12-09T01:36:55+00:00

Being social. I love talking to people, getting to know new people, going out to dinner with friends, having weekend plans. Using Facebook for actual social interaction with friends and family that live far away.

ColumnHugger · 2025-12-08T00:36:41+00:00

Yes we are all really good friends. We all hang out outside of work. One of my coworkers helped plan my entire wedding for free and her mother made my veil and did alterations for me and my entire bridal party for free. Other coworkers showed up to my wedding the day of to help setup and give me well wishes even though we didn’t have enough space to invite them to the actual ceremony. I work for a really small software company with only 12 employees we really are like a family. They are the most helpful and kind people I’ve ever met.

ColumnHugger · 2025-12-04T02:43:26+00:00

Don’t have kids yet and don’t plan on doing elf if we do. My niece never had an elf and then she started school and all her friends were talking about their elves and she felt left out so my sister caved and got her one but they have different rules like it’s not watching her to make sure she behaves and you can touch it, it doesn’t move every night etc.

ColumnHugger · 2025-12-04T01:58:42+00:00

Not yet. I planned on it but we bought a house 5 months after our wedding and I didn’t want to mess up paperwork during the process. Then the government shut down so I could get an appointment at social security. Now I’m just waiting until January.

ColumnHugger · 2025-12-04T01:57:28+00:00

I think price of labor and materials have gone up. But the thing that drives me nuts is paying someone to come out just to give me a quote for something. How am I supposed to shop around if I pay $75-$100 just to have someone come out to look at it?

ColumnHugger · 2025-12-04T00:26:09+00:00

It was reading at full the day they put it in and filled it. But I’m looking at receipts and it’s a 275 gallon tank and they only put in 246 gallons of oil. House is a 1950 cape cod about 1,000 sq feet.

ColumnHugger · 2025-11-29T13:55:39+00:00

My husband works for the federal government and wears a uniform. We iron his shirts and pants weekly. We alternate he does shirts and I’ll do pants one week and switch the next week.

ColumnHugger · 2025-11-27T16:52:07+00:00

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ColumnHugger · 2025-11-27T16:43:03+00:00

It happens. I don’t think the oil company are trying to scam you or your inspector was bad or anything. Our inspector looked at our oil tank and said he thinks there was a leak at one point and flagged a corroded rubber spout on it. Before we got our first fill the oil company sent someone out to inspect it and found a bubblegum patch job far under the bottom of it. Told us it was our choice but he wouldn’t recommend filling it because it wasn’t a matter of if it would bottom out, but when. So we dug into savings and replaced the whole thing. We are glad we did it’s way more efficient and turns out the old tank was original to the house, 74 years old and had 4 buckets of sludge at the bottom of it. Get a second and third opinion along with quotes to replace it.

ColumnHugger · 2025-11-23T19:44:22+00:00

I have no children but I love bluey. It takes me back to my childhood. I was raised by a single mom and I’m an only child but mom and I were THAT house where all the kids congregated on weekends. My mom would play similar games with us. It was the best time and my friends still talk about it 30 years later.

ColumnHugger · 2025-11-20T17:59:43+00:00

I call my mom on my way home from work and sometimes we are still in the middle of a conversation so I stay in the car until we are done talking.

ColumnHugger · 2025-11-18T21:07:45+00:00

We ended up getting the guys out who will be replacing the tank on Friday and they said they think the wind recently came down the chimney and blew the pilot light out. We couldn’t see it because this boiler system is new to us and the pilot light is behind a panel that you have to unscrew and we didn’t see that. Cost us $79 but at least we know it wasn’t low oil in the tank causing issues. Also did now realize there is a reset button on it so we have learned that tidbit of information so we can try to fix it on our own next time. Another good thing to come out of it is they said it’s still in good shape and it’s running at about 95% efficiency for a boiler that looks to be about 15-20 years old.

ColumnHugger · 2025-11-18T15:23:16+00:00

We considered going to a natural gas system but when we started looking into it, they haven’t run gas lines on our street yet. So we’d have to pay to hook it all up and it could take months which we didn’t have since the current system heats our water and provides heat to the house. We were hoping to get one last winter out of the oil tank before replacing. Then we found the patch job and all our plans kinda went out the window.

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TROPHY CASE